Into the Zone

Note: another province has opened up to the west of this map, but it doesn't affect our present travels. I'll update as appropriate in future...

Me and my mate are now in our hunting zone where we intend to pursue good deeds on the roads. We have stayed in Tzilacaapan for 3 days, will probably then go to Cuauhtinchan for one more day of fishing. Then we will hop onto the 'nodes' and head south to the sacrificial area. All this time we have been eating meat which we bought up in Tecalco. With five days of travel to the first roadside shrine, my mate will have increased his fighting coefficient to 3 (on a scale of 1 to 5). I will have joined him at that strength level within the week.

Travel in RK and in TN occurs at the rate of two nodes a day unless one has purchased 'tokens' (with real money) in which case one can travel three nodes. If a town is on the node one stops on, one will be in the town for the following day. If one stops on a node without a town, one will be 'on the road' the following day. If one is in a town, one can visit its taverns and markets (and one's own home property if the town is one's home town). If one is on the road, you just camp out. The disadvantage of stopping at a town is that a lot of people notice you. If one slinks around 'on the nodes' and don't stop in at the towns one has a good chance of passing undetected through the countryside.

PS: I am updating this map as we go, tracing our path through time.
3/2/09 - travelling on the nodes south of Cuauhtinchan. Between the town and the intersection to the south is actually another node, so it is a full day to the intersection, another day to the mine site node.
7/2/09 - Successful sacrifice south of Huehuehtlan.
9/2/09 - Sacrifice west of Tecamachalco
12/2/09 - Sacrifice on the five way intersection (shown as 3 way on map above) by far and away our most successful sacrifice yet.

Blog on blog

Came across 6D6 Fireball on the comments to another gaming blog. It seems to act as a digest of gaming blog articles, concentrating on traditional Fantasy RPG and Wargame miniatures sites. Worth the odd look for a taste of what else is happening on the gaming blogosphere.

Fishing in Tzilicaapan, Church in Dumfries

My Aztec character is presently fishing in Tzilicaapan with his friend while we both eat meat before heading further south to do good deeds. Our apprenticeship in the dark arts has already commenced with our studying the rather idiosyncratic laws of the various provinces of the Empire. For example, one province encourages roadside sacrifices on Wednesdays and Saturdays, another sets aside one week a month for the purpose. It is all academic as we consume our meat diets in honour of the war gods (to raise our combat proficiency) but we will soon venture forth to do good so is handy to know.

My Scottish self has spent about a month in the rather unfriendly town of Dumfries. For the first few weeks I tended to defend the walls of the castle, but have of late been spending my days contemplating life in the church. From being an extremely tense situation when I first arrived (to the point that suffered an assassination attempt on first attempt at entry) the town has calmed down such that there are no longer any mobilised armies here. I would call this "mission accomplished." With any luck, will close the pub and start the return journey to Whithorn tomorrow. Have a mountain of paperwork to deal with.

I've been away from home IRL over the past five days. Managed to keep an internet connection, despite being 500 miles from home and having the use of a borrowed laptop. I'm not generally a fan of pay-as-you-go intenet, but sure is handy when travelling. I did enjoy the 'rest' of having only to deal with the basic ingame functions of my Tribal Nations and Renaissance Kingdoms MMORPGs, giving the multimedia aspects (chat, forms, etc) a break.

Monster Camp

Last night I watched a TV show called Monster Camp. It is about a fantasy Live Action Role Play group near Seattle. Very interesting. Basically, used a weekend meeting of these keen 'live FANTASY role play gamers to document what they do and who they are that do this strange thing. Well made as a reality mode film, with lots of little subplots between the characters on the way. Not to mention the intrinsic interest of seeing the sea elves, vampires, lizardmen, goblins and all sorts of assorted heros and heroines which these people turn themselves into for the weekend.

Basically, for seven years, some keen fanatics have run similar weekend gatherings for groups of gamers in the woods in a nearby national park. College age and above, there are about 50 odd folk that turn up for the show. Perhaps a dozen are involved in the running of it all ('plot keeper', logistics, on the 'plot team', costumery, admin, etc), about twenty play Non Player Characters at the orders of the plot master, the rest are Player Characters.

I won't describe their weekend or how they do what they do except to say that it looks tiring, fatiguing and fun.

I nearly switched off several times, some of the subtexts to the documentary were striking close to home I suppose. Other times, my heart went out to certain of the characters, or I found myself nodding in understanding at the various existential problems (!) which they were revealing to the camera (ie. the crossover between Real Life and In Game, personal growth through gaming, the bonds one forges with other players, the importance of the social, the stress of playing against people with different ethics, etc etc etc).

I don't think that I'd go and do the Live Action Role Play gaming myself, but I can understand why those who do, do so.

The film was certainly a good show when taken as a whole. If you are into any type of role play gaming, see it if you can.

Aztec Odyssey

Above is a map taken from the Tribal Nations forums, showing the extent of that world at the moment. My home town is Tecalco. I have just been on a journey to Quecholac, Xochimicatzinco, Cuauhtlan and Epatlan. I'll soon be heading off with a friend via Ehuacalco to the Southern province to do good deeds.

Sure.

I am going to be spending a few days away from home and have access to web only via someone else's computer. So I needed to store my map somewhere where i can access it. Might as well be here as anywhere else...

Another Roman gamer blog

I came across Bigredbat recently, a newish blog with a pretty serious miniatures ancients gamer behind it, judging by the armies to be seen on it.

Happy Hogmonay 2009!

May your dice roll true!

(My new banner in Tribal Nations)

In the Dog Days

Xmas 2008 has been and gone and we're now in the period between xmas and New year. The romans used to call these the 'Dog Days' and, at different times in their history, held the Saturnalia festival through them. I use them to think a bit about what has been and what is to come.

Miniatures - very little activity on this front. I have accumulated a number of 1/32 figurines of Napoleonic French to paint up, have started some but my painting room keeps being used as a spare bedroom (heresy!) whenever the urge hits, so have stalled. Similarly with the He 123 model. As for the miniatures wargaming, a distant memory waiting to come to life again!

Comp Games - Updated my versions of East Front and Operational Art of War. Played a small series of EF games v friend via email. Lost a week of my July Holidays to playing 'Great Invasions' - if I can find the time this holiday I'll be getting back to the dark ages for at least some of the time...

IL2 Flight Sim - Have accumulated only a few dozen hours flight experience this year, mainly in the form of chase scenarios to sharpen up my own skills while waiting for the time and energy to get back into the online arena.

Blogging - This blog has suffered also this year, with only a couple dozen posts on it - and a lot of them seems to be focused on the one aspect of my present gaming life (online MMORPG). On the other hand, my favorite bloggers in the gamesphere keep going from strength to strength and have kept me going when I wonder what it's all for. Keep it up guys!

MMPORG - Continue to immerse self in Renaissance Kingdoms. Becoming reasonably skilled at the modes of online organsiation and communication which this game relies upon. Have thrived in the RP aspects of the game, even having my 'home RP' being nominated for Kingdom wide awards (a great privilege). Clan Leader, General of the local Regiment, Advisor to the Steward of Scotland, local celebrity, peace keeper, traveller. My online persona keeps me busy! Meanwhile, on the other side of the planet, my aztec peasant in the Tribal Nations continues to grow strong in his pursuit of fishing and bean farming and will soon be strong enough to tour ancient mexico.

So - it's been a good year for MMORPG for me, but the other aspects have suffered. Due to domestic issues, for example, have hardly touched a 'traditional game'. As 2009 creeps over the horizon, I wonder what will be next in the evolution of this little gamer.

Happy yuletide to you and yours, and a safe new year! May your dice continue to roll above the odds!

RIP Gary Gygax

I've just learned that Gary Gygax, co-author of the original Dungeons & Dragons, passed away earlier this year (March). Quite a shock and a tear in the eye.

This guy affected my life in a very major way, and gave me many many many hours of some of the most exciting friendship filled fun.

Despite the monster run away commercialised mega rip off that the orginal game seems to have changed into (it was out of his hands for more than the past decade, in defence of his memory), Gary's ethic was always to have fun, cut the crap, remember that the game is all. So true.

R.I.P Gary Gygax

New Banner on RK forums

My new banner for use on RK forums.
Took me 20 minutes to make.

Wargamer's Delight

Before I launch off into another RK story, I should say that I'm flying again on IL46. Not a lot and not online, but am enjoying the feel of the virtual wind beneath my wings and the clattering life and death experience of stalking german bombers in my russian fighter plane. Still not a great pilot, but am building a bit of technique up. Beats me how some of the pilots I've seen can be so good!

Back to RK.

One of the joys of this historical MMPORG is the sense of wheels within wheels, layers within layers, always something being beyond the horizon when one tries to understand how the world works. Some of this is in relation to the 'rules' of the coded game (which admin have let the players work out for themselves as a deliberate act of policy).

Much of this sense of 'a bigger world out there', which generates the immersive effect of the game over time, comes from the forum based structures the various players have created to regulate the community. From the Clans and Guilds and Robber Armies to trading emporiums, court and church hierarchies, to governmental structures from town councils to National Assemblies, these larger bodies add meaning to the simple day to day actions of so much that goes on. One of these large organisations is the Royal Scottish Army.

Put simply, Scotland's three counties each has a Regimental structure composed of town bands, each commanded by a Band Leader. The Regiment is commanded by a General, assisted by a Councillor. Together with the Field Marshall sitting on top of the structure, the Generals and Councillors form the RSA High Command. The High Command is answerable to the people through the Steward of Scotland, who spends most of his time in the (s)elected National Assembly.

Most of the soldiers, however, are hardly aware of these arrangements.

The guts of the RSA is its town 'band' structure. Each town maintains its own Band, commanded by a Band Leader. They tend to be subdivided into Groups, which are led by Patrol Leaders. Groups perform the daily work of patrolling, guarding, escorting as required.

Thus, Galloway Regiment has about 50 soldiers organised into five town bands of varying strength and ability, performing a range of tasks that requires steady communication and reliability amongst its members. At its peak we had nearly 100 soldiers, but since then there has been an attrition of leaders as well as troops, partly due the stresses of conflicting goals and ambitions, partly due the stresses of frustrating game system changes over the past three months.

Due various ingame (rebellion, going rogue, being sued) and outgame (loss of connection, lack of time) our Regiment has suffered the loss of its last few Generals over the period when we needed them most. This has contributed to a sense of leaderlessness, which is poison to an army.

So, I was asked to become the General of the Regiment, an honour and a privelege. After considering the additional demands on my time and the stresses I was about to subject myself to, I accepted the promotion.

This is a wargamer's delight. It's like all that theory of supply, logistics, training, command being added on top of the more typical 'military' things of maneuver, combat, deception, coded into a game with thousands of players each taking a little role in character, facing off in real time other groups similarly composed. It's getting close to the 'real thing' as far as admin and organisation go.

I'll be filling in on this blog some of the things I do as general in between the battles which hardly ever happen. It's the stuff between the battles that determine who wins them. So I find it all pretty exciting (in an RK, long term kind of way),

My gamer ethic in the RK

I recently posted the following on a RK forum. It forms part of a discussion about the fact that RK is a game, written in response to the increasing incidence of incidents of flaming, disrespect, harassment and (in some corners of the realm) a growing sense of ennui as players develop their characters to the 'outside edge' of the envelope (sort of like, "where do you go when you've got max stats in any game?").

BJB had posted earlier in the thread that he thought that much of this was people taking it all too seriously, mixing up their ooc and ig personas.

Hear Hear to much of what bjb said. In my little ubergamer view things there's a number of things at play. For a start, many of us are at different levels.

I see RK as many games in one (strategic, managerial, political, powergaming, role playing, chat/relax, historical trip). Inside each of these games lie various tactics and strategies. Each of us comes to this world for something a little different. On top of that, each of us brings our own type of gamer ethics.

The level at which I'm at stresses the RPG aspect of MMORPG. So that's where the following is coming from...

In game terms, the scheming plotting power playing megamaniac character is welcome in any game I play in. The rebellious criminal mercenary powermonger character is equally welcome. An elitist political interfering corrupt government should be the norm. All I ask is that the playing field is level and people don't shout at each other.

My character has adopted a certain persona. That has become 'real' over time. (And a little of Drac has crept into my persona also!) I too have been through that experience of the two personas blurring, though I think I managed to avoid the mental breakdown and the flaming that so often comes from that. I think I reverted to maintaining my responsibilities to clan and other bodies i was in, being a 30 minute player while I recovered.

I look around me now and see looming threats to a fragile nation, lots of entrenched attitudes and clashing personalities. The markets are getting closer to bursting, the economies are about to crash. And of top of it all the platform is unstable.

I the player am amused with the realistic potentials I see here for acting out historically accurate plots and subplots ingame. Be they rebellion, coup, war, economic collapse, etc. There are many darksides to this game. That is good and, from my readings of the wisdom of LJS, the way it is meant to be. For it gives us the chance to struggle to make things better.

My character will certainly do all he can to ensure that the present structure continues as long and as strong as it can. I wouldn't expect anything else from him. The player behind the character is pretty certain that that will lead to an entirely different style of game evolving as his world is changed around him.

Drac will be disturbed and might even lash out at that time. But that will be Drac, not me the player. It's a delicate balance at times.

But well worth the effort.

Just thought I'd share that with you.

Territorial Ambitions

I came across this post about territorial level D&D play over at The Verbing Noun. Made me think about the concepts of territorial ambitions for high level characters, initially in terms of old time RPGs but then in the new world of online RPGs i'm presently entranced by.

I never got one of my D&D characters up to the level 9 or 10 necessary to attain the level of territorial control, but I sure always thought it would be cool to do so. I did play in a campaign once where the world in which our characters lived and died was actually a D&D based strategic game, complete with monthly turns and table top wargames. That was fun.

These days, when I get my RPG kick out of the online MMPORPG Renaissance Kingdoms, the issue of 'territory' is soon going to rear its head in a fairly big way across the Kingdom. Some of the more egotistically altruistic players with Kingdom wide reputations will soon make a play to take over a County in a big way, setting up break away Kingdoms etc.

Which will drag me into it as a leader of the resistence, a royalist rebel, etc. Will be fun.

Cthulhic Laugh

Just came across this post about Cthulhu plush toys and similar weird things over at Jerusalem Gamer. Big laugh, especially the Cthulhu baby coat...

Cottage on Loch Fyne

Three weeks in real time have passed, about 48 hours in the RP started last month. It is an interesting experience, this RP on the forums of a MMORPG.

I and my two thieving comrades met up on one thread at 'Ben Gloum', began to establish our characters. We have since ran a thread on another of the forum's boards called 'Cottage on Loch Fyne'.

The events so far are quite simple. We came across a lone cottage with a barn. We snuck a look at the barn. Hearing some disturbance amongst the cattle in the barn, the lone occupant of the cottage retreated to her room and bolted the door. We took the cattle. She emerged after we had gone.

We have travelled through the night. On the morrow we are hoping to utilise a ferry across the Loch so that we can move the cattle to the southern markets before winter arrives. It will be sometime after we have crossed Loch Fyne and are working through the valley routes towards Loch Lomond and the southern cattle markets that we expect to meet up with a bunch of soldiers.

The soldiers have been exercising and practising their archery on another thread on yet another board. Our times lines are now roughly synchronised. Our NPCs have developed over the past month. It will be an interesting meeting when our group changes threads again to become NPCs in their's.

For interest sake, the cottager was played by another NPC of a player I asked to play the role. She did probably the only thing she could have done to keep her character alive and her cottage still standing. The Ferryman will likewise be another NPC played by yet another player I have invited. I am the only one who has any idea of who else is actually behind the masked NPC characters. Adds an element of mystery to it all...

'Scout', by the way, tracked the army group on their own thread for a couple of weeks, eventually retreating to the opposite side of the Loch and watching from a distance, before he faded into the woods and 'headed north to catch up with his boss'. He might be the deus ex machina we have up our sleeve as badguy NPCs crossing the mountain valleys with our stolen cattle when the army catches up with us.